This ambitious parade mural in Andalusia is 18 feet tall and 127 feet long. PHOTOS BY MARK STEPHENSON
‘An outdoor art gallery’ Hardin, who was raised along the Gulf Coast, started painting beautiful,” Palmore says. That small town needed to make a drasin high school. His introduction to large imagery came early, tic change after the mill that employed many of its residents thanks to a teacher who let students paint on the school walls. shut down; city leaders decided to turn the town into the mural His first commission was at a Panama City, Fla., community capital of Canada. They commissioned artists from across North college, to paint the story of the English literature hall. After America and Europe to paint a series of murals. studying illustration and ad design at the Art Institute in south At the time of the Palmores’ trip, the town reported having as Florida, he continued to build a portfolio of work done on walls, many as half a million people to tour its murals. As a town on buildings, on gym floors and in stadiums, the route to the ski slopes, it had a natural working for private and corporate commistraffic draw, and the city leaders capitalsions as a freelance designer and illustrator. ized on it. He became creative director of an out“I thought, we just have to do murals in door company in Dothan several years Andalusia, not only to show our history, ago, and now continues to live and work but to make it beautiful like Chemainus,” there as a portrait artist and muralist. DoPalmore said, perhaps also luring tourists than features several of Hardin’s impressive to stop on their way to and from the Gulf murals -- a salute to the peanut industry, Coast beaches. Others in Andalusia knew DeSoto’s journey through the Wiregrass Police officer J.D. Shakespeare in the of Dothan’s murals, and learned about Harand a tribute to cowboy hero Johnny Mack parade mural. din; he has also done eye-catching murals Brown among them. in Brewton, Colquitt, Ga. and Blakely, Ga. Dothan was also how he came to Andalusia’s attention. SevThe city put together a murals committee, which Palmore eral years ago, retired Andalusia educator Pat Palmore and her helps to spearhead, and commissioned Hardin to do the first muhusband and some friends vacationed in Vancouver, British Co- ral, which was the “Legends of Andalusia” on the side of a local lumbia. While traveling, the group saw signs advertising the city radio station just off the court square. He has done several others, of Chemainus, which had become known as a “mural city.” including a salute to Covington County’s early school days and a “It was just like an outdoor art gallery. It was just absolutely series dedicated to utilities, with one panel that depicts the early
This mural recalls Covington County’s cattle industry.
Alabama Living
MAY 2015 13